Prose and Poetry

Under this heading we will address a number of related issues. First the difference
between the two forms of speech as they are present in the Bible, and the tendency
of narrative writers to make speech more poetic when it is formal or of greater
importance. Then the significance of two issues in the relationship of biblical
narrative and poetry:

the biblical "national epic" is told in prose, other Ancient Near
Eastern epics are told in poetry

biblical narrative often includes lengthy poems (as well as short embedded
poetic fragments) which may tell the same story as the prose

How prose and poetry differ in the Bible

There are biblical scholars who deny that there is a hard distinction which
allows us to identify some books or passages in the Bible as poetry. One of
the most powerful markers of the distinction in the print age has been how the
words are disposed on the page. Poetry is written in discrete lines. In the
manuscript tradition of the Bible poetry is not marked that way. However, in
the system of marking the stressed syllables and giving indications of how the
text should be sung in synagogue (which dates back to 500-700AD, but was based
on already ancient practice) the books of Psalms, Job and Proverbs use different
accents from the other books. Which suggests that these books were felt to be
different from the others.

In practice while a neat and absolute distinction is hard to substantiate for
biblical Hebrew there do seem to be clear differences on a scale with texts
like most psalms at one end, and obviously prosaic texts like the sermons of
Deuteronomy or the narratives of Kings at the other. The "poetry"
is terse, comprised of very short lines (2-4 words in Hebrew) that echo each
other as well as building. The prose is more wordy, sense units are of varied
length, and echoing seems less powerful. In between lies speech which is between
these two poles, which like much of the preaching of the prophets is fairly
terse, with often identifiable short lines and fairly strong echoing.

As well as these differences of form poetry and prose in the Old Testament
"work" differently. As we have seen, while prose narrative has an
identifiable narrator, biblical narrators are distant and do not strongly mark
their presence on the text. By contrast the "Is" (or sometimes "we")
who speak in biblical poetry are strongly identified and make no secret of their
attitudes, hopes and fears. Narrative has a strong "plot" and sequence
(even non-narrative prose tends to a sequential storylike organisation) while
poetry (even when it does "tell a story") is organised more around
attitudes and emotions, it celebrates or laments more than it recounts.

When speech goes "poetic"

Biblical narrative presents the speech of characters in ways that help us build
up a picture of what they "are like", so their speeches reflect this,
a pompous person sounds pompous, a proud one sounds proud... For example the
fragments stumbling and leaping over each other in the girls response to Saul's
simple question "Is the seer here?" in 1 Sam 9:12-13
gives a vivid impression of their excitement and the desire of each of them
not to be left silent faced with the tall handsome young stranger!

Tissot's picture of Sarah laughing when the birth of Isaac was
announced to Abraham (from CTS)

Yes, there he is just ahead of you. Hurry; he has come just now
to the town, because the people have a sacrifice today at the shrine. As soon
as you enter the town, you will find him, before he goes up to the shrine to
eat. For the people will not eat until he comes, since he must bless the sacrifice;
afterward those eat who are invited. Now go up, for you will meet him immediately.

Consequently, when a character speaks of important or portentous matters their
speech often goes "poetic" coming close to the rhythmic brevity of
a poem. Similarly the narrator's own speech can take on such formal tones. Fokkelmann
(176-7) illustrates this in the scene where the birth of Isaac (the long hoped-for
bearer of the ancestral promise) is announced:

3 The LORD dealt
with Sarah 2 as he had
said, 3 and the LORD did for Sarah
2 as he had
promised. 3 Sarah conceived and bore
3 Abraham a son in his old age, 4 at the time
of which God had spoken to him. (Genesis 21:1-2)

This is extremely close to the strictest poetic diction, notice the rhythmic
repetition of line lengths (measured in word units) and how the final line is
marked by being longer, the terse short lines, and the parallel structures.
This speech is very different from the girl's burbling.

Prose Epic

We now know several "epics" from other Ancient Near Eastern cultures,
some of begin with stories similar to those in Genesis 1-11. Others tell the
tales of great heroes. All of them are in poetry. Ancient Greece too had epic
poems, but Israel's stories are told in prose. With the exception of fragments
- like Lamech's taunting song (Gen 4:23-4) - and the occasional longer
poem interspersed in a prose frame - like Ex 15:1-18 (cf. the fragment
or refrain in v.21) - biblical epic though it stretches from Creation to Exile
(Gen - 2 Kings) or to the Persian period (1 & 2 Chron, whether or not we
include Ezra & Nehemiah) is told in prose.

While Europeans trained in the classical tradition were inclined to see this
as a sign of unsophisticated - simple rather than literary - style, today we
are more inclined to notice the skill and artistry of the telling.

Since the late seventies scholars (at first predominantly Israeli and Jewish,
but later a consensus) have recognised also a theological motive for this genre
choice, as this quote from Shemaryahu Talmon already made clear:

The ancient Hebrew writers purposefully nurtured and developed
prose narration to take the place of the epic genre which by its content was
intimately bound up with the world of paganism, and appears to have had a special
standing in the polytheistic cults. The recitation of the epics was tantamount
to an enactment of cosmic events in the manner of sympathetic magic. In the
process of total rejection of the polytheistic religions and their ritual expressions
in the cult, epic songs and also the epic genre were purged from the repertoire
of the Hebrew authors. (Talmon,
354)

Robert Alter
(quote from p.25 but see the whole chapter) citing Talmon claimed that "It
is peculiar, and culturally significant, that among the ancient peoples only
Israel should have chosen to cast its sacred national traditions in prose"
and developed this insight to deepen our understanding of the functioning of
biblical narrative.

The ancient Hebrew writers, as I have already intimated, seek
through the process of narrative realization to reveal the enactment of God's
purposes in historical events. This enactment, however, is continuously complicated
by perception of two, approximately parallel, dialectical tensions. One is a
tension between the divine plan and the disorderly character of actual historical
events, or, to translate this opposition into specifically biblical terms, between
the divine promise and it's ostensible failure to be fulfilled; the other is
a tension between God's will, His providential guidance, and human freedom,
the refractory nature of man. (Alter, 33)

When we have both prosaic and poetic accounts of the same events it is interesting
to compare the two, and notice what each style achieves best.

Poetry embedded in prose

The fragments of poetry, like other "embedded genres", in prose narrative
serve to make the account lively and lifelike. In this case the poetry is often
sharply distinct. Embedded songs and poems also allow the prose narrative to
"borrow" some of the emotive power of the poetic form. So in Genesis
4 the genealogy in verses 17ff. shows the close relation of this form with narrative
proper as it continually "breaks into" narrative:

Adah bore Jabal; he was the ancestor of those who live in tents
and have livestock. (Genesis 4:20)

This often happens in genealogy, since genealogies are a sort of compressed
narrative where generations of lives are recounted in moments. Even more interesting
though is the way a few verses later the list breaks into song:

Lamech said to his wives:
"Adah and Zillah, hear my voice;
you wives of Lamech, listen to what I say:
I have killed a man for wounding me,
a young man for striking me.
If Cain is avenged sevenfold,
truly Lamech seventy-sevenfold." (Genesis 4:23-24)

The poetic form carries the tone of Lamech's boast powerfully, and so shockingly
brings home to us what humanity has become through the seemingly simple (and
almost innocent according to some readers) disobedience of Eve and Adam in chapter 3.

Sometimes the biblical narrative contains two (juxtaposed) versions of the
same event, with the prose recounting of the affair followed by a song celebrating
its significance. In some cases the song does not even come close to recounting
events, as in Exodus 15 it is difficult to match the descriptions in the
song to the events of the previous chapter(s), though it gives a powerful impression
of what these events meant for Israel! In Judges 4-5 by contrast the song comes
much closer to narration, and is as close as the Bible really gets to epic poetry.
Judges 5 gives vivid pictures of the characters involved, which can be
compared with the pictures provided in the prose account in chapter 4.

It is an interesting exercise to read both chapters closely with an eye to
questions of characterisation, point of view etc. and to compare their tellings
of this story.